Textures and poetry--Still solid

MOjave is the most unique Concrete Blonde effort so far. The feeling is textural and emphasized the imagery of the desert as well as using the desert for source material for the songs. If you hear the title track you have experienced a desert sunset, in all its glorious colors. My personal favorite track is Snakes. Johnette takes us on a hunt in the desert night. The description and characterization of the snake is accurate. Forget any metaphors. You are there in the sand in the moonlight. Mojave is well worth a DL. One recurring theme and line is to "Shed Your Skin" A good idea for musicians. Especially when you grow to big for the old one.

Still Great

Mexican Moon

Mexican Moon is my favorite. I have downloaded this and Group Therapy and will see what I think of them. I wish though that Mexican Moon would be put up so I could download that. I should have bought it in stores when I had the chance.

Essential

While 2002's Group Therapy was a welcome old friend coming in from the cold, it's tight rhythms and measured, wistful recollections-Think umm-"Roxy" (duh), "Tonight", "Violent", "Inside/Outside" were (in retrospect) rightfully panned by some as Roxy worship and reunionism, albeit extremely well done. This beautifully textured, loosley played and emotionally delivered album bears none of those earmarks. In fact Mojave almost fits perfectly between Bloodletting and Mexican Moon, sonically speaking. Songs are stories of the eerie and sometimes enchanting Southwest and the mysteries of the desert.
Throw this album in the old cd changer (you do still have one, right?) and hit random, and see if you don't start forgetting how NEW this album is! Essential for Concrete Blonde fans, completists and even new initiates.

Back From the Desert

Mojave is Concrete Blonde's second full album since their rise from the ashes after 1995's burn out. While "Group Therapy" didn't abandon the raw emotional honesty Napolitano is known for, the album seemed a bit flat and distant. It really did feel like group therapy.
It would seem that the Therapy did plenty of good. Mojave is beautiful but edgy -- much like singer/writer Napolitano. The album ranges from dirty grunge guitar work to western ( Concrete Blond's cover of Johnny Cash's "Ghost Riders in the Sky" is a highlight of the album ); tracks combining Mojave Native American sounds with CB's signature rock with spoken word.

After reuniting for 2002′s Group Therapy, Concrete Blonde disappeared into the desert. Singer/bassist and occasional psychic medium Johnette Napolitano’s Southwest is a spiritual hotbed of shamanistic sunsets and coyote-fueled nights, and on Mojave the veteran Los Angeles trio ably provides its soundtrack. Guitarist Jim Mankey and drummer Gabriel Ramirez paint a dusty, ominous, and urgently bleak background for Napolitano’s husky voice, a voice that once married the lupine howl of Chrissie Hynde with the kerosene croak of Tom Waits, and is now as dry as the desert itself. Mojave is atmospheric and tense without ever really sinking its teeth in, despite the promising opener, “A Road.” There are attempts at melody (“True to This”) and humor (“Jim Needs an Animal”), but the overall effect is like listening to a compilation of Nick Cave B-sides — the mostly spoken title track aims for Cave’s “Tupelo” but never delivers the musical thunder that its sublime imagery hints at. The Death Valley funk of “Someone’s Calling Me” recalls the Concrete Blonde of old and an eerie cover of “Ghost Riders in the Sky” provides some choice spooky moments, especially when Napolitano reaches for her higher register, but as a whole, the album suffers from an odd formlessness. Mojave isn’t a bad record, but its reliance on regional lyricism requires a less meandering musical coat. – James Christopher Monger